As The GOP Wages Wars, Who Remains On Their Side?May 9, 2012By Deborah Montesano

Heaven help the world if the GOP is ever again able to initiate wars against other countries! It’s all we Americans can do to fend off their assaults on us:

Students. Tuition at colleges and universities is skyrocketing.Nevertheless, Congressional Republicans want to slash funding for Pell grants. They’re also blocking legislation that would keep the student loan interest rate from doubling on June 1st. All their attempts to de-fund public education and use vouchers to enrich private schools are direct attacks on both students and teachers.

Women.The fireballs they are hurtling at women are too numerous for one list. Consider these:laws limiting abortion rights and contraceptives; mandating invasive procedures for pregnant women; redefining rape in favor of the rapist; blocking funding for women’s healthcare; objecting to raising the minimum wage (for jobs that are held primarily by women).

Seniors.The GOP must think it can solve the problem of an aging population by frightening seniors to death—especially about healthcare reform. For instance, they lie about reform creating government ‘death panels’ that will decide who is worthy of health care. Republicans are trying to privatize Social Security with dire and false reports about how quickly the program is going broke. Efforts to turn Medicare into a voucher system and to lower future Social Security benefits are meant to eviscerate the system. The proposed Ryan budget in the House of Representatives would create drastic losses in benefits for seniors in order to generate investments—and profits—for Wall Street.

Gays. The ‘family values’ party only has one version of what a family looks like. TheRepublican Governor of New Jersey, Chris Christie,just vetoed a bill that would allow gay marriage in his state. A gay adviser to Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign was recently forced out of his position by the prejudice of the party faithful. North Carolina amended their constitution to prohibit gay marriage. Even though 50% of Americans support gay marriage, only 22% of Republicans do so.

Latinos.At a time when Latinos have become a substantial proportion of the population throughout the Southwest and California, Republican legislators are passing legislation that is virulently anti-immigrant. As a result, American citizens of Latino descent are racially profiled and inappropriately detained. Latino families are being torn apart by ill-considered deportations that are instigated at the local level.

The poor. Republicans are ripping holes into society’s safety nets as fast as they can, attempting to cut food stamp eligibility, unemployment benefits, public healthcare programs, child tax credits, free school lunch programs for kids. Much of this slashing of human services is in the name of preventing cuts to the military. The irony is that many military families ARE the poor.

The middle class. Much of the above directly affects the middle class, for instance, reductions in Pell grants and the raising of interest rates on student loans. More obviously, at a time when the country still hasn’t recovered from recession, Republicans want to end the payroll tax cuts for the middle class while refusing to raise taxes on the wealthy; and, even though gas prices have risen dramatically, they also refuse to end the subsidies for the oil industry—subsidies paid for by the taxpayers—thus protecting the massive profits of corporations and siphoning off funds that could be used for the benefit of the people.

How can the GOP possibly alienate all of these voters and still hope to garner a majority at the polls? Their attempts to suppress the vote can’t do the job for them. For Republicans to win, people still need to mark ballots in their favor.So, who will these supporters be?Well, the GOP targets don’t include a heading for ‘rich’.Or one for ‘white’.Or one for ‘male’.

Apparently, the GOP didn’t get the same memo as the rest of us:the majority doesn’t look like it used to. We run the gamut from poor to middle class; we’re ethnically mixed; female; we range in age from young, struggling students to older retirees who’ve lost pensions; we have families who are often headed by women, and sometimes by gay partners.

Top Opinion

It's great that you're proud because you aren't too bright. France might be a good place for you, or maybe Greece. Amazing how you LPs are too lazy to succeed on your own so you want to tax people who work and earn money to death. Well, guess what. Taxes will eventually come down to your level as well, or at least to the middle class. You can steal ALL the money from the 1% and pay our interest to China for about 3 days. So once you start getting more and more of their money, they will either sit down or move out of the country because they can afford to. Then the taxes will move down to 10%, 20%, until it gets a majority of the population. You LPs don't have much in the way of a thought process to not figure that out, but it appears to be all about being lazy and envious of others.

You've thrown out so much interesting propaganda from the left, it's clear that you've been bought by the idea of freebies galore as well as little Deborah has. Like she's the definitive expert on those matters, NOT.

It's great that you're proud because you aren't too bright. France might be a good place for you, or maybe Greece. Amazing how you LPs are too lazy to succeed on your own so you want to tax people who work and earn money to death. Well, guess what. Taxes will eventually come down to your level as well, or at least to the middle class. You can steal ALL the money from the 1% and pay our interest to China for about 3 days. So once you start getting more and more of their money, they will either sit down or move out of the country because they can afford to. Then the taxes will move down to 10%, 20%, until it gets a majority of the population. You LPs don't have much in the way of a thought process to not figure that out, but it appears to be all about being lazy and envious of others.

You've thrown out so much interesting propaganda from the left, it's clear that you've been bought by the idea of freebies galore as well as little Deborah has. Like she's the definitive expert on those matters, NOT.

Just saw where FB co-founder Eduardo Saverin is giving up his US citizenship and moving out of the country. The article says its for tax reasons and that there is a growing number of Americans doing this, moving to countries that are more "tax friendly." Keep taxing the rich and soon the 1% will leave the country. They didnt get rich by being stupid:)http://www.bloomberg.com/news...

Exactly what I've been saying. They will move because they have the money to move and the taxes will be levied against lower incomes. Eventually that 1% will be down to the 50% and we'll be just as broke as the rest of the world for a crappy communist ideology.

Why is it that you and I are the only ones to see this????? It is common sense, like I said before, the rich didnt get that way by being stupid. I would do the same. I dont mind helping those that are truly in need but the waste that goes on in this country is an abomination.

It may not be a matter of people not seeing it as much as seeing it but denying it for personal gain and ideology. Those on the receiving end of many entitlements are like the Greeks and French. They don't care if their country goes down the toilet as long as they get their freebies and don't have to work. At least half of this country is populated by lazy folks who either feel as though they are owed a living or just too sorry to get off their duffs to work. They want a nanny to take care of everything. They are selfish to the core and could care less about anyone but themselves. They will just go on their way expecting the government to figure out where to get the money. They don't care whether the government steals the money from folks with a work ethic or not. They are subject to penis envy and hatred for the folks who work and want to punish them by taking their money.

Once the lazy and shiftless found out they could vote to give themselves entitlements they began to vote the country out of existence. They could care less about the ability of the American taxpayer to sustain the debt regardless or not if it's unsustainable.

I'm concerned about everyday Americans having a very short memory. Of course I also know that the majority of Americans have no clue what's going on in the world of politics. They won't pay attention until a month of two before the election. Right?